Weird Oakmont: How the ghosts of Pittsburgh still reign over America's toughest course

"Let the clumsy, the spineless, the alibi artist stand aside! A shot poorly played should be a shot irrevocably lost!"

Those are the words (alleged) of W.C. Fownes, son of Henry Fownes, the man who bought and created Oakmont Country Club in 1904. They were tough, uncompromising men—the elder Fownes, a first-generation American with English parents, lost his father at age 15, quit school, and became a giant in the steel and iron industry before selling out to Andrew Carnegie at age 42 and becoming massively wealthy. His home club wasn't tough enough for him, and when he was misdiagnosed with heart disease, he dedicated his time to the only course he would ever design, Oakmont. Built on farmland near the Allegheny River, the treeless plot of land was perfect for his aim of creating an "inland links" course modeled on Scotland, right down to the clubhouse. He put in 350 bunkers, raked them with a "devil's backscratcher" that put impossible furrows into the sand, and made sure the greens ran at ridiculous speeds. When it began, it was a 6400-yard par 80 that included a par-6.

Thanks to the fearsome nature of the course and the influence of Fownes and his son (WC became a top-notch golfer who won the U.S. Amateur in 1910 and later served as USGA president), it wasn't long before the really big tournaments started landing in Pittsburgh. Next week, Oakmont is set to host its tenth U.S. Open, the first ever course to reach double digits in that event, and when you add in the three PGA Championships held there, only five courses in the world and only one in America (Augusta National) have hosted more majors.

The winners throughout that time, including the U.S. Amateurs and the women's U.S. Opens, seem to hint at something slightly supernatural, or at least mystic, happening at Oakmont. In the course of researching this week's Local Knowledge podcast, we found three themes that seem to repeat at Oakmont's biggest events:

1. Players with a history of off-course suffering seem to fare well here, as if being rewarded for their resilience.

2. Superstars tend to be abused, from Palmer to Watson to Woods, unless they fall under category 1.

3. There are constant rules fiascoes.

What's remarkable is how consistently these themes reappear throughout the century-plus of majors at Oakmont. This week on Local Knowledge, we explore that eerie recurrence, and argue that as strange as it sounds, there are some unseen hands on the steering wheel at this fascinating venue—America's true "beast of the east."